Nikki Gemmell - With My Body

Remembering the child you once were. Marinated by light.

At school, among the other girls, you are riddled with awkwardness. At having to join them, be one of them, and you will never belong, they all know that but here you are different, you are your true self. Balloon girl, zippy with happiness, flying on your Peddly, firm, confident; it is your default mode whenever you are back in your world.

At sunset the golden light washes like a mist over the land and then the sun dips behind a hill and the glow is snuffed out, so sudden, and the night chill is there; you gaze from your verandah at the spill of stars and the watching moon and the sky running away and then move to your bed and your hand slips between your legs and the vividness begins, in your head, the technicolour movies, every night, to lull you to sleep: people watching you – fresh, prized, wanted; an entirely different world to this; a house of beauty and abundance, of books and talk and laughter and warmth; men, many of them; your legs parted, on your back, your fast breathing, your hot wet.

All that you have, the only power that you have, lies in your body. You are fourteen, you have no other power in your life.

At night, alone, in command, confident; the open wound of your life forgotten, the rawness that can only be sutured by love, the necessary verb.

To rescue.

To combust.

‘In this one small thing at least it seems I am wiser – that I do not think I know what I do not know’

Socrates

Tenderly reared young ladies

The art room.

A new teacher. Mr Cooper.

A man.

Extremely rare in this place. He is one of a series where visiting artists run workshops in the school, explaining what they do; he is collected by the parents of Sophia Smegg, the richest girl in the class. He is young. A painter, apparently, a good one – his work has already been hung in the Archibald Prize.

His trousers have worn, grubby knees and paint splatters; a red sock peeps from the toe of a sneaker. He has made no concession to being in this place of constraint.

You are riveted. You are not the only one. You can taste the alertness in the air. And as the entire class of fourteen year olds gaze at this new specimen in their midst, something happens to his trousers. They grow. They stick out. At the crotch. It is excruciating, it is fascinating, it is appalling. Every girl in the class knows what it is. Every girl in the class cannot take their eyes from it. The entire phalanx of girls is silent, spellbound. Mr Cooper’s face reddens, he has barely begun his talk. He falls silent.

He excuses himself.

Mr Cooper does not come back.

He has left the school, it is understood.

The next artist is a porcelain painter, a woman of seventy-six.

None of you know what happened after Mr Cooper left the room. You suspect he exited so rapidly because of deep embarrassment; couldn’t face any of you again and you are intrigued by that, the blushing, mortification, vulnerability.

So. Mr Cooper. Gone from your life. And you will never forget. The power in you, in all of you. That collectively you could do this to him.

You feel too much, think too much; the intensity of the fantasies, every night before sleep. The Penthouses, at home on weekends, for when you are alone, vividly alone; you cannot look too much, it is unbearable, the intensity. And it is not the pictures of the men that excite you, intrigue you, it is the women; the men look terrifying, you cannot deal with that bit, but at night, every night, to lull you into sleep, the movie begins in your head. You are fourteen, you are not meant to know any of this. You are intrigued by your body, the concentration of what’s between your legs, the potency of it, the way it changes its viscosity, its dynamism – what is it for? Your hand, in wonder, exploring.

Your life hasn’t begun yet. When will it? You are aching for it to start.

Would it raise the value of men’s labour to depreciate ours? Or advantage them to keep us, forcibly, in idleness, ignorance, and incapacity? I trow not.

You have a fascination with artists, creators, thinkers; people who express and reveal and articulate. Because you come from a world that resolutely does not and as you get older the exclusion from family and home and hearth – the lack of explanation, the silence – only gets worse.

Your father walks into your verandah room one Saturday and almost steps on a canvas flung across the room, a self-portrait screaming its paint, and murmurs, ‘Sometimes I wonder what I’ve raised.’ Serious, befuddled, fearful. Of the female with a voice in his midst.

In your early twenties you will say to him, ‘You know, Dad, some time I’d like to write a book.’ And he will respond, swiftly, ‘Waste of time, that,’ and never sway from his thinking and the distance will grow even wider between you. The two Chinas joined at the hip, once, bush mates – and that chasm will only be broached when you become a parent yourself; put in your proper place. Normalised. To your father, come good at last. And by then the writing dream will have long gone because you have always taken heed of what your father says; he is that ingrained in you, you have wanted to please him that much.

But at fourteen, you crave difference. So, the obsession with artists, creators, thinkers, the opposite of anything you have known in your life. All that: an escape. A world where people communicate honestly and openly; touch, laugh, cherish, seize life, sizzling like luminous fireflies in the dark; feel deeply and passionately, yes, yes, all that.

Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily

Friday afternoon. Central Station. You have just bought your train ticket to get you home for the weekend; you are walking across the concourse.

Ahead. Mr Cooper.

You, in your school uniform.

He glances at you, blushes. You are one of those girls he never wants to see again in his life; the whole school is laughing about it, at him. It is a split second, a moment. You could walk straight past him, not look.

You walk up to him.

‘Are you OK?’ Not knowing why that comes out, all you can think of is his reddening face, the vulnerability, the sweetness in it. It makes him oddly approachable.

‘Yes,’ he stammers, bewildered. ‘Were you …?’

‘Do you live near here?’ Blurting it out, covering up his awkwardness.

‘Yes, my studio’s across the road.’

‘A real, live studio?’ Your eyes sparkle. ‘Wow.’

‘Yes,’ he laughs. ‘It’s disgustingly messy, I’m sure it’d disappoint you.’

‘No!’ In the presence of a man you are blushing, changing, becoming something else. Losing the sharp flint; have you ever been like this?

‘Come and have a look.’

You nod, barely knowing why or what you are getting yourself into, words won’t come, you’ve lost your voice, your heart is thumping, you walk beside him, your insides flipping. If only the other girls in your class could see you now. Something, someone, has taken over your body, your talk. Your curiosity has emboldened you; yes, the experiment will start here, now. You have to do this, you need to know.

‘You don’t have somewhere to go, do you?’ he says at the entrance of his scruffy building.